Procrastinator meets Workaholic

Something people who meet me quickly pick up on is my ability - or rather, compunction - to take on workloads the ordinary person would look at with despair. If I'm not busy - or not, at least, thinking I am - most moments of the day, I find it really difficult to, ironically, switch off. I've been told I need to get better at taking time just to relax - but for me, work is relaxing. Sometimes. It's complicated.

Because alongside a compulsive need to be productive at least half the time, I've also got a tendency to get distracted. I don't think it's any form of ADHD - even though I've even had people suggest it could be. It's not that I can't focus for long periods of time, when necessary, or focus on boring tasks. It's more that I quite easily lose my train of thought, and unless the work I'm doing is particularly engrossing of one of my senses, I lose my way. This most often happens in the transitional period between finishing one bit of work and starting another. Right before I started writing this post, I'd been putting together narrative choreography for one of my game projects and refining some bugs here or there. I'd intended to slap on some Crockett's Theme and get right to writing, but ended up watching a drummer listen to "Enter Sandman" and then try to replicate the drumbeat. I'm not even into rock particularly!

Now that I'm writing this post, ideas come to me just fine (though Jan Hammer's iconic notes are probably at least somewhat contributing to that). When I've got music on and I've sat down to do a task, I can focus on it almost unwaveringly, and sometimes get so much work done in such a little amount of time I shock myself.

Being a workaholic - and I'm pretty sure I am one, as I have a daily to-do list that features all work and no play - often brushes up against one of my favourite hobbies - playing games. I'll probably go into greater depth about this at some other point as the concept fascinates me, but I am naturally drawn to games that have some kind of "progression system". Whether that be hunting for an upgrade for your character, meeting a particular achievement, or setting my own end goal to reach, I find it difficult to enjoy and spend time in a game that just exists solely to burn time. Ironically, when you think about it, all games burn time - the three hours I put into Destiny 2 today didn't turn into money, or skills that are going to be helpful outside of the gaming space. Nonetheless, my workaholic brain is satisfied - at least a little bit - if I'm playing a game with goals.

I really will talk about this in its own blog post, so for now I'll leave it there. I think I get this compulsion to always work from my mum - my dad does his 9-5 generally and then settles down for the evening. Often he has other chores to do but if he doesn't, he won't feel compelled to find some. My mum, on the other hand, is a dervish. She is compelled to find more household chores to complete; more issues to resolve; sorting always, and finding new pursuits. She has a steady exercise routine, like me (another topic for another time, I think, given how close it is to my heart). I inherited my dad's love for technology and leadership and people; but from my mum, I got the workaholic gene.

Luckily, people seem to like workaholics. In retail, my constant need to fill my time with productivity did me well and is probably part of why I got promoted. Before I left, I committed to taking no breaks and coming in early to do more work. I started doing it out of a sense of duty, but how quickly I adapted to just working, the entire day! I don't think it's healthy even for me to go nine hours of manual labour and people interacting without a break, but I can't say I despised it as much as I did.

So it is that if I'm working, I work real hard; and if I'm not, I find it hard to start working. If I could get just a little better at the procrastinating thing, the amount of work I can get done would surely be some kind of a superpower. We all have our vices, I suppose. Mine is that I'm just as likely to bang out a 2000 word essay at 2-1 or 1st grade in 30 minutes as I am to watch Minecraft Hardcore World Tours for that time instead.